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Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, essayist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most o ...

is a symphonic poem for chamber

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * String instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, ...

Background

Wagner composed the ''Siegfried Idyll'' as a birthday present to his second wife, Cosima, after the birth of their son Siegfried in 1869. It was first performed on Christmas morning, 25 December 1870, by a small ensemble of the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich on the stairs of their villa at Tribschen (today part of

Lucerne Lucerne ( ) or Luzern ()Other languages: ; ; ; . is a city in central Switzerland, in the Languages of Switzerland, German-speaking portion of the country. Lucerne is the capital of the canton of Lucerne and part of the Lucerne (district), di ...

), Switzerland. Cosima awoke to its opening melody. Conductor Hans Richter learned the

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz musical ensemble, ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest Register (music), register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitche ...

in order to play the brief trumpet part, which lasts only 13 measures, in that private performance, reportedly having sailed out to the centre of

Lake Lucerne Lake Lucerne (, literally 'Lake of the four Waldstätte, forested settlements' (in English usually translated as ''forest cantons''), , ) is a lake in central Switzerland and the fourth largest in the country. Geography The lake has a compli ...

to practise, so as not to be heard. The original title was ''Triebschen Idyll with Fidi's birdsong and the orange sunrise, as symphonic birthday greeting. Presented to his Cosima by her Richard''. "Fidi" was the family's nickname for their son Siegfried. It is thought that the birdsong and the sunrise refer to incidents of personal significance to the couple. Wagner's opera '' Siegfried'', which was premiered in 1876, incorporates music from the ''Idyll''. Wagner adapted the material from an unfinished chamber piece into the ''Idyll'' before giving the theme to Brünnhilde in the opera's final scene, the "Ewig war ich" love duet between Brünnhilde and Siegfried. This theme, Wagner claimed, came to him during the summer of 1864 at the Villa Pellet, overlooking Lake Starnberg, where he and Cosima consummated their union. He is contradicted, however, by his own obsessive record keeping: the melody was composed that 14 November, when he was alone in Munich. The work also uses a theme based on the German lullaby, " Schlaf, Kindlein, schlaf", which was jotted down by Wagner on New Year's Eve 1868 and introduced by a solo

oboe The oboe ( ) is a type of double-reed woodwind instrument. Oboes are usually made of wood, but may also be made of synthetic materials, such as plastic, resin, or hybrid composites. The most common type of oboe, the soprano oboe pitched in C, ...

. Ernest Newman discovered it was linked to the Wagners' older daughter Eva. This and other musical references, whose meaning remained unknown to the outside world for many years, reveal the idyll's levels of personal significance for both Wagner and Cosima. Wagner originally intended the ''Siegfried Idyll'' to remain a private piece. However, due to financial pressures, he decided to sell the score to publisher B. Schott in 1878. In doing so, Wagner expanded the

orchestration Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra (or, more loosely, for any musical ensemble, such as a concert band) or of adapting music composed for another medium for an orchestra. Also called "instrumentation", orch ...

to 35 players to make the piece more marketable. The original piece is scored for a small chamber orchestra of 13 players:

flute The flute is a member of a family of musical instruments in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, producing sound with a vibrating column of air. Flutes produce sound when the player's air flows across an opening. In th ...

, two

clarinet The clarinet is a Single-reed instrument, single-reed musical instrument in the woodwind family, with a nearly cylindrical bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell. Clarinets comprise a Family (musical instruments), family of instrume ...

bassoon The bassoon is a musical instrument in the woodwind family, which plays in the tenor and bass ranges. It is composed of six pieces, and is usually made of wood. It is known for its distinctive tone color, wide range, versatility, and virtuosity ...

, two horns,

, two

violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...

viola The viola ( , () ) is a string instrument of the violin family, and is usually bowed when played. Violas are slightly larger than violins, and have a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of the ...

cello The violoncello ( , ), commonly abbreviated as cello ( ), is a middle pitched bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), tuned i ...

and

double bass The double bass (), also known as the upright bass, the acoustic bass, the bull fiddle, or simply the bass, is the largest and lowest-pitched string instrument, chordophone in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding rare additions ...

. The piece is commonly played today by orchestras with more than one player on each string part. Modern performances are much slower than those of earlier years.Brown, Jonathan (2012). ''Great Wagner Conductors – A Listener's Companion''. O'Connor, A.C.T.: Parrot Press, pp. 769–770 (a list of timings from Hans Richter, 14 min 30 s, to Hans Knappertsbusch, 20 min 36 s)

References

External links

* * , Munich Philharmonic,

Sergiu Celibidache Sergiu Celibidache (; ; 13 August 1996) was a Romanian people, Romanian Conducting, conductor, composer, musical theorist, and teacher. Educated in his native Romania, and later in Paris and Berlin, Celibidache's career in music spanned over fi ...

, 1993 live in Philharmonie am Gasteig, Munich {{Authority control Compositions by Richard Wagner Compositions for chamber orchestra 1870 compositions Symphonic poems Compositions in E major Der Ring des Nibelungen